The culture and subjectivity of neo-liberal governmentality

Abstract:

This article forms part of an ongoing investigation into and research on the dynamics,
culture and forms of subjectivity of neo-liberalism. Seen through the lens of French
philosopher Michel Foucault’s analyses of neo-liberalism as a form of governmentality,
neo-liberalism emerges as a political programme intent on subjecting the political sphere
- along with every other dimension of contemporary existence - to an economic
rationality. The focus of this article is on the impact on conditions of work and subjectivity
of an economic rationality that has become the dominant political programme. In other
words, Foucault’s analyses of neo-liberalism as a particular historical form of power
called “governmentality” facilitate a critical understanding of the post-industrial culture of
work and the concomitant mechanisms of subject-formation in the contemporary West.
Like most concepts in Foucault’s diagnostic toolkit, governmentality is an analytical
notion closely linked to changing historical rationalities of power, rather than a rigid
descriptive mechanism that establishes one rationality of governing once and for all, that
is the same for all times and places, and that infuses political orders in predictable,
regular and uniform ways. It is my contention that Foucault’s analyses of neo-liberalism
of the late 70s remain instructive and relevant to reach a critical appreciation of neoliberalism
as a particular form of power that infuses the formation of culture and
subjectivity in the present. This article utilises a historical approach in which one epoch,
notion or governing rationality is understood in terms of that which precedes it,
acknowledging some continuity while respecting and reflecting on discontinuity and
differences. More specifically, I explore the post-industrial culture of work in terms of the preceding industrial age; biopower in terms of the preceding notion of disciplinary power;
and neo-liberal governmentality in terms of the preceding liberal governing rationality. By
way of an introduction and contextualisation of the problematics, I first outline the
differences between the industrial and post-industrial paradigms of work from a
sociological perspective (sections 2-4), before moving on to Foucault’s analyses of (neo)-
liberal governmentality (sections 5-6).